Like Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Jean-Fery Rebel was brought to the Parisian court as a child prodigy, and lived to enjoy a long and productive career as a musician and composer. Beginning as a creature of the court of Louis XIV, he later was a major protagonist in the controversy over the Italian versus the French styles, championing the more modern style. Late in life he gained fame for a wildly aberrant orchestral suite, “Les Elemens” in which he experimented briefly but dramatically with atonalism.

The works presented here date from the middle of Rebel’s career, late in the reign of le Roi Soleil, when all Paris was embroiled in a raging controversy over which musical style was superior: the French or the Italian. The King and his minister of music, Lully clearly favored the French “Lulliste” mode (despite the fact of Lully’s Italian heritage), while the modernists (including Francois Couperin) favored the more energetic, forceful imported style.

Of the pieces presented on this disc, the Suite(1705) reflects Rebel’s fondness and respect for Marin Marais, while the Sonatas, as their title suggests, show the impact of Arcangelo Corelli. Interestingly, the final Sonata returns almost entirely to suite form and gesture, suggesting that Rebel may have come down on the side of his countrymen in the end.

As with the Jacquet de la Guerre, the gamba part is often given material entirely independent of the basso continuo, rendering these sonatas more like trio sonatas, or, as the French would call them, Sonates en trio.

Like Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, Jean-Fery Rebel was brought to the Parisian court as a child prodigy, and lived to enjoy a long and productive career as a musician and composer. Beginning as a creature of the court of Louis XIV, he later was a major protagonist in the controversy over the Italian versus the French styles, championing the more modern style. Late in life he gained fame for a wildly aberrant orchestral suite, “Les Elemens” in which he experimented briefly but dramatically with atonalism.

The works presented here date from the middle of Rebel’s career, late in the reign of le Roi Soleil, when all Paris was embroiled in a raging controversy over which musical style was superior: the French or the Italian. The King and his minister of music, Lully clearly favored the French “Lulliste” mode (despite the fact of Lully’s Italian heritage), while the modernists (including Francois Couperin) favored the more energetic, forceful imported style.

Of the pieces presented on this disc, the Suite(1705) reflects Rebel’s fondness and respect for Marin Marais, while the Sonatas, as their title suggests, show the impact of Arcangelo Corelli. Interestingly, the final Sonata returns almost entirely to suite form and gesture, suggesting that Rebel may have come down on the side of his countrymen in the end.

As with the Jacquet de la Guerre, the gamba part is often given material entirely independent of the basso continuo, rendering these sonatas more like trio sonatas, or, as the French would call them, Sonates en trio.